The goal: To purge 465 items from your house within one month. We pushed it to the very end. On May 30th Matt and I still had 98 items to purge. I was worried we’d struggle at the end because each weekend, I’d go room-by-room clearing out everything I wanted to get rid of only to count the items and find I’d purged barely fifty. So I’d hunt through the house to find another fifty. On our last weekend of purging, I thought it would be even harder, but it wasn’t; it was the easiest.

I think purging becomes addictive. It became easier to get rid of stuff I liked, but never used or am keeping for “just in case.” I suddenly didn’t want it anymore.

I’d highly recommend doing a materials purge if it’s up your alley at all. You start to notice just how much you accumulate over time. Matt and I moved into this house six years ago and there were items I packed, made my friends help us move and I haven’t touched them since. That’s crazy. It actually felt good to get rid of them. We had over twenty packs of playing cards. I purged eight wooded […]

The Minimalist’s Purge Game CompleteMaggie Downie2018-01-13T16:19:52+00:00

I’m amazed. Giving up dairy, sugar and most grains last Monday hasn’t been as hard as it normally is. The only thing I can think of that accounts for the difference is that I felt really ready and motivated to try this experiment.

Normally when I give up sugar for a month, I think about sweets—ice cream, muffins, and chocolate in any form—hourly. I’m truly in awe that I’ve been okay…that is until last Thursday—four days in—when I drove by Starbucks. Now, I’m not a big coffee drinker. In fact I don’t like it. Still a couple years ago, I started needing a little caffeine fix on Thursday afternoons. I get a mocha to mask the taste of coffee and very often I only drink half. I found myself pining as I drove past the green goddess. And the urge didn’t dissipate until Sunday. It didn’t help that I was visiting a friend in New York where Portland’s Stumptown Coffee was in nearly every shop. Stumptown is my favorite, and I longed to go inside a small coffee house with a good conversation […]

Over the weekend I was in central Pennsylvania, which is known for the best potato chip. The secret ingredient is lard, which makes everything better. I know this because my Grandma’s pie crust has lard and it is delicious. Pie crust aside, I know this because I love food. I love it too much. So much that trying one bag of potato chips seemed insufficient, so my friends and I decided to have a chip taste test. Kay and Ray’s was the winner, but we got to go through multiple bags and multiple brands. I’m pretty sure I still feel the grease dripping out of my pores.

With this as just one example of how poorly I’ve been eating, I’ve decided it has to stop. I need to make a change for my waistline, but more importantly for how I feel. And even more importantly for the parts of me that I don’t feel—arteries, kidneys, liver—but that I want to fuel in a better and healthier way.

Starting Monday, May 9th I’m going back to my December Detox. See the link for full details. I’m making a few tweaks. I’ll be eating sweet potatoes, quinoa, some rice, and legumes if […]